# Is there such thing as a "White American Overclass"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 28, 2008, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975 "2008-12-28T17:26:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/21 "2008-12-28T21:15:32Z")
> [@](#): > > The point is that BrainGlutton has a history of left-leaning economic postings so Lind’s text must be reanalyzed as prescriptive hints for the purposes of this particular GD thread. Is Lind left leaning? Definitely, though more of a populist than a conventional leftist. Making claims that the overclass keeps black people down? Not Lind. He’s never made that argument. In fact, he’s actively hostile to that kind of argument. ---
**Author:** ![Ruminator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Ruminator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruminator)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/22 "2008-12-28T21:25:49Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > Making claims that the overclass keeps black people down? Not Lind. He’s never made that argument. In fact, he’s actively hostile to that kind of argument. I’m not saying Lind thinks the overclass keeps blacks down. I guess I can’t articulate to you why the other replies do have relevance. Defending Lind is not necessary for this thread. Lind is not the source of debate; Lind’s text is simply being used as a component of a larger ideology. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/23 "2008-12-28T21:35:12Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > Is Lind left leaning? Definitely, though more of a populist than a conventional leftist. > > Making claims that the overclass keeps black people down? Not Lind. He’s never made that argument. In fact, he’s actively hostile to that kind of argument. I haven’t read him. But I would find the chosen title of “white overclass” to be specifically provocative. If you’re going to invent provocative terms (speaking about Lind), I’m going to be hesitant about trusting your stated intentions. “WASP” is at least widely used, and no one would have any particular difficulty understanding “the upperclass”, “the wealthy”, or “yuppies”. If he doesn’t want to imply stuff, his choice of vocabulary is rather poor. Perhaps you’re right and he didn’t intend anything, but I’d not bet large sums of money. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/24 "2008-12-28T21:43:12Z")
> [@](#): > > So is there a formal and exclusive “White Overclass” or is it just a cliche? Well, this is the OP. It asks a question in reference to a passage by Lind. I don’t see any references to the claim that the overclass specifically keeps black people down. Since Lind doesn’t typically make those kinds of arguments, and is generally opposed to them, a passage from Lind is of no use for that type of argument. Should the OP then accuse BrainGlutton of misusing Lind’s work? If BrainGlutton himself is accusing the overclass of keeping black people down, then reference BG’s post, not a quotation from Lind’s work. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/25 "2008-12-28T21:49:32Z")
The OP just sounds like a windy restatement of [“Stuff white people like”](http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/full-list-of-stuff-white-people-like/). ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/26 "2008-12-28T22:02:41Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > I haven’t read him. But I would find the chosen title of “white overclass” to be specifically provocative. If you’re going to invent provocative terms (speaking about Lind), I’m going to be hesitant about trusting your stated intentions. > > “WASP” is at least widely used, and no one would have any particular difficulty understanding “the upperclass”, “the wealthy”, or “yuppies”. If he doesn’t want to imply stuff, his choice of vocabulary is rather poor. Perhaps you’re right and he didn’t intend anything, but I’d not bet large sums of money. That’s just it. The overclass isn’t merely White Anglo Saxon Protestant anymore. It’s this ongoing merger of Ashkenazi Jews, and upwardly mobile Christians of mostly northern European ancestry from the Midwest, South, and West. It’s no longer WASP, but still very much white. If Lind says, “White”, and you automatically think “black”, you’re reading way too much into things. The analysis of the overclass just doesn’t have much to do with black people. I suspect if Lind were asked, he would say that he left East and South Asian overclass members out of his analysis because they are concentrated in science and technology, and haven’t as of yet sought much political influence. ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/27 "2008-12-28T22:09:19Z")
> [@Cosmic Relief](#): > > The OP just sounds like a windy restatement of [“Stuff white people like”](http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/full-list-of-stuff-white-people-like/). Which hearkens back to [Paul Fussell’s Class.](http://books.regehr.org/reviews/class.html) Part of what Lind is saying, is that most white people aren’t “white” in the stuff-white-people-like sense. In his book, Fussell points out an uncomfortable truth, that most white people aren’t upper middles, and will never be, though it’s the status that many aspire to. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/28 "2008-12-28T22:23:35Z")
> [@Cosmic Relief](#): > > The OP just sounds like a windy restatement of [“Stuff white people like”](http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/full-list-of-stuff-white-people-like/). I basically agree, and I would call it more of a “subculture” than a “class.” ---
**Author:** ![Belowjob2.0](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Belowjob2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Belowjob2.0)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/29 "2008-12-28T22:32:07Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > I basically agree, and I would call it more of a “subculture” than a “class.” The members certainly intermarry, and they’re certainly more likely to marry each other than outsiders. They are also able to perpetuate their advantages from generation to generation. I call this a class. Is the existence of this class, and its disproportionate influence over our lives a bad thing? Lind thinks so. I’m not sure if it’s more bad than good, but I suspect that it’s inevitable, given that any advanced industrial society requires a cadre of bright, hard working conformists with advanced training and skills to keep it running. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/30 "2008-12-28T22:49:18Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > The members certainly intermarry, and they’re certainly more likely to marry each other than outsiders. They are also able to perpetuate their advantages from generation to generation. I call this a class. I suppose it depends how you define “class.” For example, suppose some corn-fed boy from Iowa does well on his SATs and ends up going to an ivy league school; where he becomes a bit of an environmentalist, starts listening to NPR now and then, and seriously thinks about applying to grad school. If he starts dating a coed who is part of the whole SWPL set and things get serious, will her parents have serious objections? Probably not. Now, you might respond by saying its unusual for that sort of kid to go that route. And you are probably right, but the point is that in large part, we’re talking about self-selection here. If you have a certain level of intelligence; go to college, and purchase a Prius, you can probably join the SWPL set if you like. So in my view, it’s more like joining your local chess or bridge club. i.e. there aren’t big barriers preventing people from joining or leaving. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/31 "2008-12-28T23:15:43Z")
the book was written almost fourteen years ago. The author describes how this “overclass” lives in a world where everything is private – including even some roads. They are walled off from the rest of us who increasingly live Third World lifestyles. I’m not sure how new this is, but I think the gap is widening. When I hear about a $50 billion ripoff and there are families in our country who try to live on $3,000 a year, it really gives me pause. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/32 "2008-12-28T23:44:52Z")
If you have any doubt about the existence of a white overclass, a viewing of the documentary [Born Rich](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/) should convince you. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2008, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/33 "2008-12-28T23:59:47Z")
> [@Belowjob2.0](#): > > There’s a lot of overlap betweens Lind’s definitions of American class and Paul Fussel’s book, Class. Lind’s Overclass is Fussel’s Upper Middle Class, roughly speaking. I think Lind’s Overclass is Fussell’s Upper Middle, Upper, **and** Top-Out-Of-Sight classes, amalgamated in the past few decades by marital ties and by cultural emulation (emulation of the Upper Middle by the others – the reverse of the process by which the newly-rich industrialists of 19th-Century Britain were amalgamated into the old landed gentry). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/34 "2008-12-29T00:06:55Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > I sort of get the point, but this guy is very sloppy, and I get the feeling that he’s kind of making stuff up in order to support an ulterior agenda. Like what? The [book](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazilianization) states a pretty clear agenda. > [@Eonwe](#): > > First, what exactly does he mean by “overclass”? It’s not ‘upper’ class, so what is it? Why not use the word class? He does use the word “class.” > [@Eonwe](#): > > Second, why use the word white, as he goes on to explain that most white people do _not_ fall into the category. The term ‘white overclass’ carries the connotation of privilege of white people over those who are not white, but that is not in fact what he describes in this excerpt. His point is that the overclass is mostly white; and that there are also black and Latino overclasses – tokens – which are dependent auxiliaries to it; and that all of that **matters.** From the same book: > [@](#): > > The chief danger confronting the twenty-first century United States is not Balkanization [fragmentation of society along ethnic lines] but what might be called Brazilianization. By Brazilianization I mean not the separation of cultures by race, but the separation of races by class. As in Brazil, a common American culture could be indefinitely compatible with a blurry, informal caste system in which most of those at the top of the social hierarchy are white, and most brown and black Americans are on the bottom – forever. Behind all the boosterish talk about the wonders of the new American rainbow is the reality of enduring racial division by class, something that multicultural education initiatives and racial preference policies do not begin to address. > > In the absence of sustained popular pressure from below or concern about America’s international status, the white overclass has no incentive to combat Brazilianization in the United States. For one thing, any serious effort to reduce racial separation by class would inevitably mean higher taxes on the affluent – not just the rich, but the politically powerful upper-middle class. What is more, the dominance of the white oligarchy in American politics is strengthened by the emergent dynamics of a polarized society. In a more homogeneous society, the increasing concentration of wealth and power at the top might produce a populist reaction by the majority. But in a society like that of present-day America where a small, homogeneous oligarchy confronts a diverse population that shares a common national culture but remains divided along racial lines, the position of the outnumbered elite can be very secure. This is because the resentments caused by economic decline are likely to be expressed as hostility between the groups at the bottom, rather than as a rebellion against the top. In the Los Angeles riot, black, Hispanic, and white rioters turned on Korean middlemen, rather than march on Beverly Hills. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/35 "2008-12-29T01:50:37Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > If you have any doubt about the existence of a white overclass, a viewing of the documentary [Born Rich](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/) should convince you. I’ve seen that documentary and I think it’s not referring to the same group of people who are the subject of the OP. > [@](#): > > you are Episcopalian or Jewish, have a graduate or professional degree from an expensive university, work in a large downtown office building in an East or West Coast metropolis, watch MacNeil/Lehrer on PBS, and are saving for a vacation in London or Paris, you are a card-carrying member of the white overclass I’ve known lots of people who fit this description, and most of them are not independently super-wealthy like the folks in _Born Rich_. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/36 "2008-12-29T03:46:14Z")
> [@spoke-](#): > > If you have any doubt about the existence of a white overclass, a viewing of the documentary [Born Rich](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0342143/) should convince you. Said documentary establishes that some kids inherit a lot of money, but not that they form a class, whatever that is. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/37 "2008-12-29T04:04:34Z")
> [@Ruminator](#): > > Not sure what “formal” would mean here. A “coat of arms” symbol that most folks in the country would recognize? A registry of family names that the FBI keeps track of? “Formal” in the context of this discussion would mean that if you did not go to the right schools or grow up in the right towns, it would be nearly impossible for you to enter the White Overclass. You would be excluded from professional or educational opportunities. The question is, are people born into this supposed Overclass or is it just an amalgamation of the collective behavior people adopt in order to be successful in Corporate America? Behaviors such as: -Going to the best schools you can get accepted to -Dressing in a conservative and professional manner -Participating in group activities, clubs and sports where you can develop your social skills and network -Pursuing careers in lucrative or prestigious industries -Hard work and discipline -Losing regional dialects or accents so as not to appear provincial or uneducated -Downplaying religeous or ethnic affiliations (Jews and Protestants aren’t usually particilarly evangelical about their religeon) In other words, it’s more of an overculture than a class, IMHO. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/38 "2008-12-29T05:46:25Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > In other words, it’s more of an overculture than a class, IMHO. There is no significant difference so long as “over-” remains the operative prefix, which, in this year of Grace, it does. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/39 "2008-12-29T09:28:04Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > You would be excluded from professional or educational opportunities. I think you are probably right. For example, you are born to a family in Class X so you are basically locked out from entering a profession tradionally done by folks in Class Y. Even if you have the skills and talent necessary to do that job. A Class Y family would be scandalized if their daughter wanted to marry you. And so on. > [@](#): > > In other words, it’s more of an overculture than a class, IMHO. I basically agree. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2008, 9:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975/40 "2008-12-29T09:32:06Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > There is no significant difference so long as “over-” remains the operative prefix, which, in this year of Grace, it does. I think the signficiant difference is the amount of exclusivity. Is it more like a chess club or a (traditional) golf club? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-such-thing-as-a-white-american-overclass/478975.md?page=3)